AGRICULTURAL AFFAIRS.

Evening Post, Volume LXVIII, Issue 134, 3 December 1904, Page 12

AGRICULTURAL AFFAIRS.

The crops are reported to be very heavy in the Martinborough district. The persistent wet weather has caused an outbreak of rust among crops in the Amberley district, where several badly affected paddocks of oats and wheat will probably be worthless for cutting. At a, meeting of the directors of the Dalefield Dairy Company last week it was stated that the number of pounds of milk received for the four weeks ending 31st October was 930,487, and the average test 3.71. The sum of £864 6s 9d was paid away to suppliers. , The Stratford- Dairy Company is nov turning out one hundred boxes of butter a day. This represents above £1400 a week. Out of a thousand cattle examined in Christchurch last month for tuberculosis forty were condemned. A plague of slugs and sob&b is reported at Otaki. The ground is said to be alive with them, and yotmg lettuce, turnips, peas, etc., are devoured almost as soon ac they appear above the ground. The large amount of rain that has fallen during the spring is given as the reason for their increased numbers. The Kaponga Dairy Factory is at present turning out about 56 boxes daily. Last week the company paid out over £1800 for October milk. ' Owing to the wretched weather which has prevailed in the Forty-mile Bush during the past month or two, practically no rape has been sown this season. The result will be rather serious for those who have lambs for fattening. As an example of the different opinions held by judges of stock (says the Christchurch Press), a two-year-old draught entire belonging to Mr. John Shearer, of Ashburton, was given the highly commended ticket in his class at the Ashburton show. At the Christchurch show the same colt was awarded first prize against the same field with a few more added. Considerable advance has been made by the cereal crops hi North Canterbury(says the Press) as a result of the rain and warm weather. In some respects the season iB a parallel one to that of 1903, which ended in a most prolific yield of gram. In the Mayfield district crops are in a backward state; stock feed is abundant, but sheep and lambs are not thrivirfg particularly well. A little air-slaked lime dusted over the potatoes as they are put in bins, .barrels, boxes, or in heaps in the cellar floor wHI prevent decay. The lime has a purifying effect, absorbing the moisture, and keeps them sweet, dry, ana fresh. Sixpence worth of limfe will be sufficient for 20 bushels. W The Glenorchy correspondent of the Wakatipu Mail" says that the results of the severe weather are serious throughout the whole district. Lambs are dying everywhere, and stock is in poor condition generally through want of the usual abundance of food at this time of the year. The Mail say 3 heavy rain set in at Queenstown on Sunday week, and was almost continuous until Wednesday. On Tuesday it was accompanied at midday by a fall of snow, and how cold it was may be gauged by the fact that icicles about 6in in length were observed hanging from the eaves of buildings in the town. .The shearing shed at the Fairfield Freezing Works (says the Timaru Herald) has been enlarged, and there are now ten machines available, while the accommodation for keeping sheep under cover has al«o been enlarged. Some of the men make good tollies, 150 sheep per day noi being uncommon. A company has ajso erected a machine-shearing shed at Chertsey, and the days of hand-shearing on farms seems done in that district. Daily farmers in the North (says the Western Star) are always complaining of the scarcity of labour during the milking season, and it was generally conceded that this district was fairly well supplied in this respect. However, this is not the case, and local dairymen appear to have the same trouble as their northern contemporaries. A Gummies Bush farmer informs us that he is unable to obtain men to mil£ nis daky herd. He has been in communication with labour agents in Invercargill for the past two months without result, which goes to prove the dearth of this class of labour locally as well as in other districts. An excerpt from Mr. Cf. C. Lance's report on the frozen meat trade in the November issue of the N.S.W. Agricultural Gazette is well worthy of notice. He writes: — "The merino strain is prominent in our meat, and although there is a market for this description, especially in the North of England, it is at a lower range of prices As Argentine meat is mostly of a similar kind, we meet the full blast of that growing competition ; indeed, the position is that Argentina, by its large and regular supplies, practically holds the market which we once held, and into which we shall find iti extremely difficult to re-enter. When seriously attempted, I believe we shall be faced with" still lower prices. I consider our best quality to be, on the whole, superior to Argentina's, but not sufficiently so, even with the utmost care, to avoid a long and bitter struggle, and one which will be against a superior organisation." A good story (says an exchange) is told of one of the Government experimental farms. One of the ploughing experts was ordered by the chief expert to take a horse and bring back a single-furrow plough. When the young expert came to where the plough stood he tried to back the horse into the handles (which he thought were shafts), instead of following the mure usual plan of hitching it to the "tree" in front. Naturally the space between the handles was too narrow for the horse, so back went the assistant "expert" to the chief expert, and to him he said, "That job cannot be done, unless you get me a much thinner horse; this one is about six sizes too fat to go between them skinny shafts." It was another assistant expert who, after trying for an hour to harness a horse, came to the chief expert and sadly said : "I've got ail the leather things on all right, I fancy, but (holding up the crupper) I can't get this thing over the beggar's big head at all. Ain't you got a horse with a thinner head?" Southland has been fortunate in regard to weather when conditions prevailing in the North are taken into (account (says a Southern paper). • "This, is the worst spring I have ever experienced during the $yhole course of my life 1 in the Taieri," remarked an old settler the other day. Unquestionably the weather is exceedingly wet, very often cold, and altogether unseasonable. Growth has had a setback of late, and, considering the little growing weather we have had, orchards and gardens are looking remarkably well. But it is not the only part of New Zealand that bad weather has been experienced. If anything, the condition of things right through the colony, from the north of Timaru, has been worse. Persistent heavy rainfall is reported from all over Canterbury aud in most parts of the North Island.

Uncle George: "I have read your article over, and I must say it shows a great deal of originality.' Arthur. *' Thanks. I'm sure ! I flattered mytelf ther"e were some ideas in it." Uncle George : " I was not speaking of the composition, but of the spelling." Knicker: "Yes, Johnny, there is only one way to learn, and that is to begin at the bottom." Johnny : "How about ewimiming?"